Sunday

After the Fall

by Victoria Roberts

"The next morning I awoke in Central Park. Everything was in its usual place, except out-of doors."

Meet Pops, an inventor, husband, and father from New York City. He lives with his family, along with their three pugs and two maids in a penthouse apartment. After the Fall is narrated by Pops' son who wakes up one day to find that his family has nothing left. He wakes up amidst their scattered possessions in Central Park.

The story follows the family and their day to day adventures in their new home. The narrator gets turned away from his private school when he can't afford tuition. Instead he goes to the Met, follows guided tours, and learns new languages by way of the tour guides. His budding actress sister trains her pugs, and later squirrels, to be the actors in her television show and play from the park. The two maids still come to the park to take care of the family. A gourmet chef from one of their favourite restaurants brings them leftovers every night. Pops tries to think up new inventions, while Mother becomes infatuated with another man.

This story is light and fun, and is peppered with cartoons. It normalizes a family being homeless in Central Park as a sort of fun adventure. Roberts deals with homelessness and marital stress in an unassuming manner. She makes clear in her story that New Yorkers can always find solace in Central Park; the park itself can be a home for you when you have no where else to go and nothing left to do.